This invention relates to an improved vehicle, of which a body structural element is formed in such a manner as to define a storage reservoir for a liquid to be used by the vehicle, such as the vehicle window wash liquid.
In current vehicles, the vehicle window was liquid, consisting usually of water with or without the addition of detergents, is normally held in suitable reservoirs housed in the engine compartment (for washing the vehicle windscreen) and, more rarely, in the vehicle luggage compartment (for washing the vehicle rear window), from which the wash liquid is withdrawn under the control of the user, normally by means of electrically driven pumps, and is fed through a suitable hose system to nozzles which spray it onto the windows to be washed.
It is apparent that, especially if the space contained in the vehicle engine compartment or luggage compartment is small, the overall size of such storage reservoirs, which have a volume of at least the order of a liter, reduces the space available for other vehicle mechanical components which may be more important from the point of view of vehicle efficiency or safety, so creating considerable layout problems for the designers during the vehicle design stage, together with considerable maintenance problems in that, because of the space requirements of such window wash liquid storage reservoirs, some components requiring maintenance are sometimes located in nearly inaccessible positions so increasing the manhours required for vehicle maintenance.